A Frenzied Franchise Takes the Fight Up Close
Within every first-person shooter, there is a little bit of Doom. That 1993 game about a space marine slaying endless swarms of demons started a franchise known for ultraviolence and a broad arsenal of weapons, and also helped usher in a generation of successors.
More than three decades later, the arrival of Doom: The Dark Ages effectively reinvents the hellish shooter with a revamped movement system and deepened lore.
Players couldn't jump or even look up in the original game as they navigated labyrinthine military bases and turned beasts into piles of flesh. The '3-D' space that made up the game's levels was illusory — sections of each location were staggered in height.
After several sequels came a soft reboot also called Doom (2016) and its follow-up, Doom Eternal (2020), both of which rewarded players for mastering aggression, momentum and frantic movement in an entirely new way. For the first time, players could double jump.
The Dark Ages takes a striking shift in tone.
The celestial, sci-fi brutality of the previous two games is swapped for medieval goth, with the protagonist, Doom Slayer, sporting a fur cape, a heavily serrated shield and spiked pauldrons. Double jumping and dashing are ditched and replaced with an emphasis on raw power and slow, strategic melee combat.
Doom Slayer's arsenal features a brand-new tool, the powerful Shield Saw, which Id Software made a point to showcase across its 'Stand and Fight' trailers and advertisements. Used for absorbing damage at the expense of speed, the saw also allows players to bash enemies from afar and close the gap on chasms too wide to jump across.
While previous titles allowed players to quickly worm their way through bullet hell, The Dark Ages expects you to meet foes head on. 'If you were an F-22 fighter jet in Doom Eternal, this time around we wanted you to feel like an Abrams tank,' Hugo Martin, the game's creative director, has told journalists.
And Doom Slayer's beefy durability and unstoppable nature does make the gameplay a refreshing experience.
The badassery is somehow ratcheted to new heights with the inclusion of a fully controllable mech, which has only a handful of attacks at its disposal, and actual dragons. Flight in a Doom game is entirely surprising and fluid, and the dragons feel relatively easy to maneuver through tight spots. They can also engage in combat more deliberately with the use of dodges and mounted cannons.
Id is returning to its roots with more grounded combat and movement mechanics, but the game isn't hampered by other quality-of-life changes like dodging and parrying. A feature of timed challenges returns with more opportunities to exercise Doom Slayer's brutality on unassuming imps and zombies.
The Dark Ages, which comes with a deep slate of accessibility and difficulty sliders, has a 'choose-your-own adventure' feel because of its diverse collection of weapons. Like in the game's predecessors, players can find secret collectibles and gather resources to improve the depth of their arsenal.
One of my favorite additions is the skullcrusher pulverizer. Equal parts heinous nutcracker and demonic woodchipper, the gun lodges skulls into a grinder and sends shards of bones flying at enemies. The animation is both goofy and satisfying.
The franchise's approach to narrative has evolved since the original Doom, which told a scant back story through the environment and intermittent onscreen text.
The 2016 game introduced an ancient war between hell and other realms in the game's universe. Codex entries such as fiery pieces of paper hovered in secret sections of the game, adding to the richness of a story that explored themes of corporate greed and divine wrath.
Since the reboot, the composer Mick Gordon's face-melting soundtrack has been driving the dread home, and this latest entry is again flooded with industrial heavy metal sounds and punchy guitar riffs.
The Dark Ages stands out for its creative reinvention. But no matter what, Doom Slayer — a stoic gladiator beset by a demon scourge — sticks to his mantra to rip and tear.
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Tom's Guide
5 days ago
- Tom's Guide
I tested the Doom: The Dark Ages path tracing update — the difference is night and day but my GPU got hotter than hell
Doom: The Dark Ages is not just a fantastically frenetic FPS to play, but it's also a graphical masterpiece — blending both the artistic inspiration of so many death metal album covers, and adopting advanced techniques to give your demon-slaying a real cinematic quality. I didn't think it could look any better, but then I got to try out the path tracing patch and my mind was blown. You see, I've seen advanced ray tracing not really add much to games over the past few months. Cyberpunk is still neon-drenched whether you have it on or off, so what can it possibly add to something as dark as Doom? Well, as it turns out, a lot. But at what cost to your GPU? I fired up my RTX 5070 Ti gaming tower and got to testing. Still not near MSRP yet, but definitely heading in the right direction. If you're desperate for an RTX 5070 Ti and you're living in the U.S., this is the best price available right now. Meanwhile, in the U.K., stock seems to be staying steady and the price is reflecting that with availability at RRP! Path tracing (sometimes, you'll hear it called full ray tracing) is a new level in simulating light and reflective materials — let's break it down. With ray tracing that you'd see on the likes of your PS5 Pro, you're getting pretty lights and reflections that simulate the physics of only one bounce of a light ray or reflection. To do more is incredibly taxing, but we're now at a point where gaming PCs are capable of it. Stepping up to the next level, path tracing simulates how light interacts with objects in a much more complex way — packing multiple rays that bounce directly and indirectly off objects, calculates both reflections and refractions, and even works hand-in-hand with a game shadowing technique called ambient occlusion to provide real visual depth to a scene. Dark Ages was already a feast for the eyes, but path tracing does indeed take it to a whole new level that I didn't expect. Get instant access to breaking news, the hottest reviews, great deals and helpful tips. The shadows of darker rooms without it could make things a little too dark, but the update brings a new brightness to things without looking like artificially placed lighting. I was expecting this to be barely noticeable, but in reality the difference can be stark. In brightly-lit scenes, that may be the case, but since a lot of the game is gloomy, this is a real path tracing Tour de Force. On top of that, the reflections in puddles (be it water or blood) or the refractions of light gleaming off the many weapons in your arsenal add a real cinematic quality to all your chaotic combat moments. No longer does reflective surfaces or substances look like kitchen foil, and neither do rougher matte surfaces see any light bounce off. Everything interacts realistically, and it is a real sight to behold. Just a quick heads-up on my time specifically with RTX 5070 Ti, though. Path tracing has a high cost to GPU memory and performance, so you're going to need DLSS 4, multi-frame gen and all the neural rendering techniques to keep the frame rate at a playable level for something fast like Doom. Without them, this drops sharply to around the 25-30 FPS level, so please AI trickery is a must-use. During my many hours of testing, I took readings at particularly GPU-intensive moments of the game to gather an RTX 5070 Ti average. Path tracing setting Frame rate Latency GPU temperature (Fahernheit) Path tracing OFF 219 FPS 14.6 ms 138 Path tracing ON 136 FPS 24.4 ms 156 That's actually not as bad as I thought it was going to be, but that is still a hefty hit on frame rate in favor of path tracing. So it really becomes up to you on whether you're a detail hog of a frame rate connoisseur. Based on these numbers, if you are on anything less than an RTX 5070 Ti, it becomes a sliding scale of how much you value that improved lighting and reflection quality vs the performance. I'll have to continue testing on other GPUs to get a fuller picture, but given the average percentage gaps I've seen across them, you'll see a roughly 22% drop for RTX 5070 (with more of a risk of topping off that 12GB of video memory, and the demand on RTX 5060 Ti would just put too much of a strain on the lesser number of Tensor and RT cores. One thing that did alarm me slightly were the increased temperatures on the 5070 Ti. It's not hitting my threshold of concern (180 degrees), and it didn't exceed this for any extended session I had of 3+ hours of gaming. But it's starting to wander a little close to it. In the defense of my GPU, it's gotten unseasonably warm here — like I just came back from LA, and the U.K. is actually warmer than it was the entire week over in Cali! But regardless, that's a dramatic uplift in performance demand and GPU temperatures. I turned on path tracing thinking it would just be like a 5% improvement for a big performance hit — flashier lights and nicer reflections that slowed down my demon-slaying antics a little too much. However, I couldn't have been more wrong. Path tracing is the real deal and the difference is stark in terms of adding impressive levels of depth and drama to each scene. The way the lighting realistically illuminates and reflections bounce make every bloodsoaked moment look like the most epic metal album cover you've seen. With all this in mind, is it worth the average 40% hit on your GPU's performance? The answer very much comes down to how important frame rate is to you. I do appreciate that uber-smoothness without path tracing turned — especially when parrying attacks. But for what it does bring to the table, this is a gorgeous, gory glimpse of graphics going forward.
Yahoo
7 days ago
- Yahoo
PS5, PS4 Players Treated to Demo for Remaster of Beloved Classics
During yesterday's , Activision and Iron Galaxy announced that the demo is now available for fans to check out. However, unlike most demos, players need to pay to get into this one. Formally called the 'Foundry Demo,' the new THPS 3+4 demo is available on PS5 and PS4 right now. However, it is only available to those who preordered the game. Users who preorder the Standard Edition of THPS 3+4 can check out the Foundry and College parks while using playable skaters Tony Hawk and Rayssa Leal. Players will also get a taste of select songs from the game's expansive soundtrack. Users who preorder the Digital Deluxe Edition will be able to play as the Doom Slayer from the hit, legendary first-person shooter series Doom. Of course, for Xbox fans, the THPS 3+4 Foundry demo is available for Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, and PC for those who preorder the game. Xbox Game Pass subscribers get to check out the demo at no additional cost. The launch of the demo coincided with the launch trailer of THPS 3+4. Along with first looks at two brand-new parks, Pinball and Movie Studio, we also got a look at the in-game model of Bam Margera. Anyone who wants to check out the trailer can take a look above. Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3+4 launches on PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, Nintendo Switch, Nintendo Switch 2, and PC on July 11. The Standard Edition costs $49.99, while the Digital Deluxe Edition is $69.99. The more expensive edition includes access to the Doom Slayer and The Revenant as playable skaters, additional songs from the Doom soundtrack, exclusive Doom-themed skate decks, and themed Create-a-Skater items. There is also a Collector's Edition that includes everything from the Deluxe Edition, as well as an actual Birdhouse deck. The post PS5, PS4 Players Treated to Demo for Remaster of Beloved Classics appeared first on PlayStation LifeStyle.
Yahoo
12-06-2025
- Yahoo
Doom: The Dark Ages Glitch Breaks Platinum Trophy
launched worldwide today, and PS5 players are running into a glitch that breaks the Platinum trophy. While it's possible to avoid the bug, there's no workaround at the time of this writing, and we can't confirm what triggers it. As pointed out by PSNProfiles user and veteran trophy hunter Chaos_Bladez, the glitch stems from Doom: The Dark Ages' Berserker trophy, which requires players to acquire all Shield Base, Shield Rune, and Melee Weapon upgrades. Players who buy the upgrades naturally while playing the game are unable to get the Berserker trophy to pop. The only solution available at this time is to wait until all upgrades are purchaseable, and then buy them all in one go. Doom: The Dark Ages received a patch last weekend when reviewers had access to the game, but that patch did not fix the Berserker trophy. If you've already run into the glitch, we advise waiting it out until Bethesda rolls out a patch. Those who've already purchased an upgrade or two, and are only just reading this, should probably create a backup save or start over if you don't want to wait for a patch. The post Doom: The Dark Ages Glitch Breaks Platinum Trophy appeared first on PlayStation LifeStyle.
